Thursday 22 April 2010

Remember, If You Get A Fine For Not Recycling…

…the answer is ‘No speakee Engrish’:
Bin snoopers have dished out the first ever recycling fine in Basildon.

A family was given the £75 charge after a rubbish inspector rummaged through their bin bags and found leftover food had not been separated from newspapers.
But then the council ran into a tricky problem…
The fine was later cancelled when it was discovered the family, who are Chinese, had not responded to written warnings because they didn’t understand English.
So, get ready for recycling advice to immediately be printed in 57 languages by your local council...
Malcolm Buckley, councillor responsible for the environment, said: “This was an isolated case and a problem was caused because of a language barrier. Once our inspector visited them, they were happy to start recycling in the way they should.”
Note that: the way that should...

According to whom?

9 comments:

Anonymous said...

So the bin inspector was a bin inspector who was rubbish?!?

JFC What's you job Dad? I'm an inspector and I'm rubbish.

Stasi tools the lot of them.

Uncle Marvo said...

Excuse my ignorance, but isn't Basildon in England?

Used to be when I worked there.

Here's one for the righteous:

WHY THE FUCK IS ANYONE LIVING HERE AND NOT SPEAKING THE FUCKING LANGUAGE?

Please let me know. I don't give up.

And no, it's not fucking racist.

[deep breaths]

Anonymous said...

I'm sure they were able to understand 'DVD? DVD?'.

Clarissa said...

To be fair Uncle Marvo, these days there are plenty of natives in Basildon who don't appear able to speak or understand the Queen's English. :)

Brian, follower of Deornoth said...

Malcolm Buckley. Racist scum.

I am Stan said...

Ello,



获得他妈的在我的本,我会说我想要什么语言

Wegards,Mr Chung.

Umbongo said...

"Once our inspector visited them, they were happy to start recycling in the way they should"

So the inspector speaks Mandarin does he? I bet he doesn't and I'll also bet that these Chinese residents of Basildon speak and read English well enough to understand any crap notices from the council. Nice to know - or have it confirmed yet again - that it's possible to exploit your ethnicity to escape the consequences of ignoring jobsworth legislation: I only wish the indigenous population could do the same.

Anonymous said...

http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/standard/article-23827003-tube-workers-taught-how-to-use-toasters-after-burning-toast-shuts-kings-cross.do


Do you think the no speeakee engrish excuse can be used here?

JuliaM said...

"Excuse my ignorance, but isn't Basildon in England?"

Nominally, yes. But see Clarissa's comment. ;)

"I'm sure they were able to understand 'DVD? DVD?'."

*chuckle*

"So the inspector speaks Mandarin does he? I bet he doesn't..."

Most council staffers only manage fluent bureacratese...

"Do you think the no speeakee engrish excuse can be used here?"

/doublefacepalm